Last week, I did something pretty rare for a single 23-year-old: I talked with a mortgage consultant. And I found out that with some perks for first-time homebuyers  in South Dakota, I'm actually in a pretty good position to buy a house.

And I'm scared.

Since I didn't take on debt to attend college, this will be my first experience borrowing a large sum of money. Sure, I've dealt with credit card debt, but that's a couple thousand dollars, not tens of thousands of dollars.

And this scares me.

I keep looking at the positives of buying a house. Like student loans, a mortgage is one of those "good debts"  that in the long run will help you financially. Another positive: not having to listen to my neighbors' bad television choices through paper-thin walls … but I digress.

However, I still get caught up when I start thinking about that dollar amount coupled with the long-term commitment. And I keep wondering if I would have been this pensive about student loan debt. In May I'll have a full year of the "real world" under my belt. That time as an adult has definitely opened my eyes financially. But if I think back to myself as a wide-eyed 18-year-old, I doubt I'd have blinked before signing a promissory note .

Now that's scary.

What was going though your mind as you took on debt for college? Did you even give it a second thought when you signed that P-note, or were you just excited to be off to college no matter what the cost?